


One, left all alone

by poisonedapple



Series: Bardic Inspiration [1]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Character Death, Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-13 20:08:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9140320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonedapple/pseuds/poisonedapple
Summary: A TPK but one, for each member of Vox Machina.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for episodes 37 & 38.
> 
> All deaths are non-canonical with no canon deaths mentioned but for Pike's pre-stream.
> 
> Everyone's in fear of (or cheering for) a TPK but I've always been like "Would one survivor be fucked up or what?"
> 
> This is a cleaned up version of a draft I posted on tumblr a while ago.
> 
> 8/12/17: Edited to fix some grammar and to add Tary and Doty.

Keyleth had always known that she would outlive them all by centuries as she would most everyone she'd come to love in her lifetime. It was only one of the many trials she'd had to accept as part of her Aremente.

Except she'd expected, naively perhaps - but then her friends had always told her all her expectations were naive -, that they might all get out of this chaos and live to die of old age. That she could mourn them one by one, give herself time to grieve for each of them with the remainder of Vox Machina. That they would have more time together – more adventures, more bar crawls, more laughter. That had been the future she'd feared all along, that the years would wear by and they'd leave her slowly until there was nothing left of Vox Machina but Keyleth and her memory.

Except the mortal life was fragile and it had only taken but moments for Vox Machina to die. All but for her alone, bloody and triumphant and defeated.

Duty demanded she to live a millennia more and Keyleth obliged. Vox Machina were but the first of many that would leave her behind but she never forgot them, her first friends – the memories she'd shared with them, the laughter, the triumphs, the failures, the things they had taught her, the values they had instilled within her, and the ache of her grief for them never quite dulled, even as she lost more loved ones as the centuries passed her slowly by.

They died, but Keyleth made sure to pass their legacy onto every young face and to take care of the things they left behind in their place.

Gone, but never forgotten.  They lived in her.

 

* * *

 

Tary felt each of their heartbeats stop, even worlds away.

 

* * *

 

 

Grog had told Earthbreaker Groon that his strength was his rage, but Groon had taught him he'd been wrong and his friends had been his strength all along.

He had never been too worried about dying. Not really. Not his own death. He'd just known that he'd wanted a good one and not by Kevdak's hand, but that was it really. If he died fighting for them, that would be the best death.

His friend's deaths, though, was another matter entirely. There was no fight good enough for them to die in. He'd known that the first time Pike had ever died, bravely, in a battle. If any of them should die, he would be glad it was him and he would be glad to leave the strongest parts of him behind. Grog had never felt despair like when one of them died, despair he'd shared with his new family each time one of them fell and rose.

This time though, none of them rose and there was none to raise them but Grog himself and he didn't have that sort of power or knowledge.

Grog was engulfed in rage, at the ones who did this and himself, and it was fiery rage for it burned with love for Vox Machina.

His undying rage burned strongly for the rest of his life and even after.

 

* * *

 

 

Percy had always wanted to die better than he was.

Percy would be grateful for the rest of his days, for what Vox Machina had done for him and for Whitestone.

But there was no better without them, not for him. Only Whitestone and his bitterness was his legacy forevermore.

 

* * *

 

 

Vox Machina had given Vax so much in their time together, it was only suiting that they each took something back when they'd died.

The absolute wonder Vax had had in the mysteries of the great universe - the wonder of the Arcane and magic, of the Divine, of the miracle it was that Vox Machina had even existed – Tiberius took with him.

Pike had been security and protection and warmth in this dangerous world, and as she died so went the pleasure of the warmth of the sun and any last fleeting feeling of safety, of home.  There was no hope of any of them rising without her.

Vax lost sight of the future he'd only just started to hope for himself, as Percy had died. Percy and Vax had had their problems, but they were family all the same and Percy had been a part of that future as much as any of the others were.

His faith, his greatest faith in the power and goals of Vox Machina most of all, died with Grog – who Vax had felt was indestructible.

Keyleth - Keyleth who filled him with awe with her every breath and word and spell, as she died all of Vax's hope of victory fled him for good.

Trinket was the death of all things precious, of all things Vax had thought were worth protecting and dying for.

All the joy and laughter was Scanlan's in death, leaving Vax feeling cold and empty.

And when his sister, his Vex'ahalia, fell all meaning in life went with her.

They had all left him, like sand falling from his cupped hands, and they left him nothing but death and the Raven Queen he knelt to.

 

* * *

 

"Tary?" A lone mechanical servant asked the empty battlefield.  "Tary?"

 

* * *

 

 

Pike had one job – she was their cleric, their healer. She was meant to keep them all alive, bring them home alive and well and whole.

Pike tried to bring them each back but she couldn't drag any one of them back to the living and her faith in Sarenrae dwindled each time she failed. She prayed and begged and pleaded, and when her Goddess did not respond, her faith faded entirely.

 

* * *

 

 

“Don't worry about me,” Scanlan had said with a grin. It would be one of the last things he ever told them.

Scanlan wasn't like Vax or Grog, always rushing in and reckless, or Percy who enjoyed a good calculated risk, but it wasn't like Scanlan particularly liked living either. It wasn't like he wanted to die, but he was ambivalent.  He didn't enjoy pain much, so it was better not to but still it would be better him than any of these crazy kids, he'd thought... until he made that promise with his daughter.

It was the bear that really rankled him.  Damn beast died shielding Scanlan so Scanlan could run and live.

And run he had, he didn't stop until he found Kaylie.

Scanlan couldn't bring himself to write and share the tale himself, but he told his daughter everything that happened because it as was a story worth telling, worth remembering but not by his own cowardice tongue.

Thousands of years later, when even Scanlan had passed himself – when there were none but gods that could personally remember Vox Machina, the people of Tal'Dorei still remembered their adventures, survived by songs penned by Kaylie Shorthalt for Vox Machina.

 

* * *

 

 

The first thing Vex does after the danger was clear was loot Vox Machina's bodies. She tossed out everything that wasn't worth much and kept everything that could be sold for enough gold to make any difference to make it work her while to carry. Bottles of wine and ale cracked and shattered at her feet and she chucked away stinking rotten Basalisk eggs. She let the unenchanted flying carpet roll out and away – it was useless but for sentiment and this wasn't a moment to care about sentiment. She prised the Titan Stone Knuckles from Grog's fists, jamming them onto hers and waited in anxiety for them to attune to her.

When they did, she used her new-found strength and size, and started cramming whoever she could into the Bags of Holding and Colding – Percy, Keyleth, Tiberius, and her brother fit into one and the gnomes squashed into the other, letting out soft sobs when she remembered that no one could survive inside the bags, but Vox Machina was already dead.

But they wouldn't be for long.

There are people who can bring them back for the right price, she's certain, even hours after. Days or years, even, if necessary. Vex wasn't exactly sure _how_ resurrections spells work, but she knew it had to be possible. It worked for Pike. Even if she didn't have enough gold _now_ , surely the worth of Vox Machina being alive would be worth it to anyone she could approach in hopes of bringing them all back to the living, even if they had to pay them back with interest later. It was only gold and gold existed to keep people surviving, living.

Grog was heavier than Trinket – she put him in the amulet and sobbed in relief when the amulet accepted him, and tucked Trinket under her arm, the stitches in the bags pulling from the weight they bared - so close to being too much even with the enchantments. Vex's adrenaline to make this happen as swift as possible kept her too busy to cry, as she ran baring the entire weight of Vox Machina.

Vex spent years, hoarding more and more gold and valuable items, searching for more and more skilled clerics to bring them all back.

It never worked.

She never stopped trying, because they were people worth breaking the world for.

 

* * *

 

 

One of the very last things he'd told them, the last time he'd ever seen them, had been that he'd underestimated them, that they were capable without him.

Maybe they had been, maybe they hadn't.

But he should have been there, with them. Tiberius never should have left them.

 

* * *

 

 

“It's alright buddy,” Vex had told him just before the last of his life left him and he'd retreated inside of her amulet. “You stay there, safe. I'll let you out as soon as this is done.”

Trinket watched from his small view into the world, listened as each of his Vex'ahlia's friends died and as she scream-sobbed for each one. He watched and waited, and his window nestled over Vex's heart, as his window stopped moving and she stopped comforting him.

He couldn't see her, her face.  All he wanted to see was her face.

Trinket was left in that amulet where time did not pass, but his window into the world did.

He let out a mournful sound and hoped that Vex would let him out soon.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. <33
> 
> Happy New Year? Let none of these things happen in Critical Role in 2017.


End file.
